Tag: pit fighting

When we first reported that Gary Goodridge wouldn’t be able to fight Eric Esch at YAMMA 1 because he was focusing on his MFC fight against Eric Pele next month, his crew came out in full force to correct us; Big Daddy was up for it, and was ready to “KICK SOME UGLY ASS.”

Well, we had no idea that Goodridge had another fight booked to go down just two weeks before his scheduled appearance in YAMMA’s Death Bowl. Apparently, he fought Mu Bae Choi in Seoul last Sunday and was knocked out in the second round. (Video can be seen here.) Subsequently, the New Jersey Athletic Control Board informed FiveOuncesOfPain that Goodridge would not be approved for his YAMMA fight due to health and safety concerns.

So, unless Bob Meyrowitz can successfully bribe the NJACB to allow Goodridge to fight on April 11th, both of YAMMA’s headlining superfights are now in limbo. Our suggestion to Bob Meyrowitz? Save yourself the headaches and do what Strikeforce did — make the two guys who lost their opponents fight each other. Butterbean vs. Oleg Taktarov isn’t a bad main event, in a county fair sort of way. Or, let Oleg slice his way through the eight-man heavyweight tournament and pull up Ricco Rodriguez to battle Butterbean in New Jersey’s own version of the Megaton. Look, your fighting surface is a freakin’ bowl — don’t act like your credibility is at risk.

If you’re Bob Meyrowitz, at what point do you just throw your hands up and say, “Alright, God didn’t want me to put together a new MMA league; I’m cursed, and my bowl-shaped ring surface is fucking gay.” Because if we were in his shoes, this would be that point.

According to TheFightNetwork, Gary Goodridge’s manager Dave Wallace has announced that Goodridge will not be fighting Eric “Butterbean” Esch in a headlining “Master’s Division” match at YAMMA Pit Fighting’s debut event on April 11th, and has chosen instead to focus on a May 9th fight against Eric Pele at a Maximum Fighting Championship card in Alberta, Canada.

You should seriously check out YAMMA’s official website. Like, now — drop whatever you’re doing and gaze upon the unbelievable tackiness of this ill-fated promotion. First of all, the slogan: “On the streets it’s against the law / In the pit it is the law,” which sounds like the tagline to every shitty Steven Seagal flick ever made. There’s also that amazing bullet-pointed list on the homepage: “The new fighting surface offers NO escape, NO give and NO mercy!” Is it quicksand? It’s quicksand, isn’t it.

The superfights should provide some decent entertainment value, in a used-up-whore-who-now-has-to-give-it-away-for-cheap kind of way, but that heavyweight tournament is gonna be brutal. Can you imagine sitting through seven matches of these bloated journeymen slapping up against each other?

In addition to a previously reported fight between UFC throwbacks Don Frye and Oleg Taktarov, YAMMA Pit Fighting’s inaugural show on April 11th will also feature a second “Masters SuperFight” bout between Eric “Butterbean” Esch and Gary Goodridge. We’re not sure what Esch is a “master” at, other than swallowing basketballs whole without chewing, but he’s built up a decent 11-5 MMA record since 2003, with wins over Wesley Correira and James Thompson; his last fight was a submission loss to Nick Penner at TFC: First Blood in December.

Gary “Big Daddy” Goodridge is probably best known for his horrific knockout-by-elbows of Paul Herrera in his Octagon debut at UFC 8 (2/16/96). He later jobbed through a mediocre career in PRIDE, then moved to K-1 HERO’s where he built up a 3-1 record since 2005. His last fight was a TKO victory last March over Jan Nortje (more on that later). Fun fact: The average age of the four men booked for YAMMA’s Masters SuperFights is 41.

As for the eight-man heavyweight tournament that YAMMA also has planned for its debut show, the word is that Wes Sims, Chris Guillen, and Travis Wiuff will participate. Here’s hoping that Bob Meyrowitz‘s new spectacle doesn’t get MMA re-banned across the country. And good luck turning a profit. This sort of thing tends to suck up money faster than Butterbean sucks up pans of lasagna.